Different Strokes For Different Folks, Plainfield Estate Sale

Art Deco Beveled Glass Advertising Sign acquired for not a whole lot at the sale in question.

Photo by Tim Weigard

Your Chicago Treasure Hunting Examiner wasn’t having any luck with the Saturday only garage sales in his neck of the woods, so he steered the Ford Edge out onto Naperville/Plainfield Road toward old downtown Plainfield. The journey was very different from his memories of riding the same route on a Honda 125cc back in High School. And the rules at the estate sale he visited were just as throwback.

Arriving an hour early at 9AM for what was billed as a garage sale of 100+ year old stuff, your Treasure Hunter soon discovered while chatting up another pair of hunters that the event was actually an estate sale. Really? Next thing you know, the woman running the sale shows up and demands that we all leave. "Go get some coffee!" Say what?!

One of your reporter’s contemporaries tried to explain that standing in line was a long-held tradition among estate sale goers, and that she would not relinquish her space on the front stoop. This did not sit well with our estate sale host who stated in no uncertain terms that there would be no numbers or "any of that nonsense." The front door slammed leaving us no chance for further illumination.

Folks, this was music to someone’s ears. To hear the person charged with running an estate sale denounce all the inane rules and regulations we’d been spoon-fed for so many years and declare, “come what may” when the doors open at 10AM all heck breaks loose was absolutely awesome. Nothing short of magic! It scared the heck out of everyone else, but since there were only a half dozen people present, whatever. Head down, elbows out, let’s go!

Must tell you at this point that your devout hunter of many, many excursions doesn’t know the name of the lady who ran this sale, but it was memorable, well run and very fair all the way around. No one left complaining or empty handed. Maybe she doesn’t like dealers, and maybe she has VERY different rules, or lack thereof.

Consider someone else's obsession with rules. Just this afternoon, crusing Naperville in a special-ordered factory stock one-owner 1986 IROC-Z Camaro with the t-tops off, some old geezer rolled down the electric window on his big ol' rice-burner pickup and admonished your Chicago Treasure Hunter Examiner at a red light for not adhering to an arcane and incredibly anal standard of his. Yeah, if you want to split hairs it's technically a rule of the road, but no one else would've noticed or complained. No one. Sometimes the rebel is revered. When in Plainfield, do as the locals do. You’ll do well for the effort!

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Imagine the treasures from your childhood discarded as an ill-conceived rummage sale donation. This was the single event that triggered decades of hunting and gathering for an adventurous soul with antiquing in his pedigree. There's a parallel 9-to-5 universe where your Examiner.com Treasure Hunter continues an advertising, PR and marketing career that began in 1981. Follow these posts to find what everyone's looking for. Email comments to hornedfroghobbies@yahoo.com.